


Outtakes

by Yeah_ALittle



Series: Batgirl Damian [3]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:54:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21894718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yeah_ALittle/pseuds/Yeah_ALittle
Summary: This is stuff that I initially wrote into The Adventures of Damian Wayne As Batgirl, but ultimately opted not to go with. Either because they went in a direction I didn't like, I didn't think they fit or I just didn't like them.Not everything I've ever written for this universe but haven't used will be here, there are some things I wrote that I'm debating adding in later, so everything I post here, it's here because I don't see it being added in in the future.  Obviously I might change my mind, but they'd be heavily editted and not put in in the same way they're posted here.This will not be posted in any sort of order. Mainly because I suck at organizing so i find outtakes from weird places a lot.Currently looking for the one where  Damian is convinced to be Batgirl in Ch1. No idea where I put that one.Enjoy!
Series: Batgirl Damian [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1577158
Comments: 3
Kudos: 36





	1. First Draft of Ch2

**Author's Note:**

> So, because this was essentially the first draft of Ch2, I'm keeping the beginning the same. I kept it the same in the final draft, or similar enough I can't immediately spot the differences atm. Obviously, none of these are complete in any way, so it does kind of stop at a weird place.
> 
> Also, at this time I felt it was better to stick with Batfam POV rather than Avengers POV.

“How were we supposed to know there’d be a news helicopter right outside Stark’s tower?” Jon whined. They got caught. A news helicopter had caught Damian and Dick jumping off the tower and Dick bent and revealed everything. Damian had tried to tell Batman that everything was fine, but the fact that they got caught by the Avengers meant that it wasn't. Jason’s broken leg didn’t help convince him either.

Telling Bats that Joker almost killed Jason again in the same vein he killed him the first time had the man fretting on Jason’s bedside and apologizing for any and all conflict. So really, Superman was lecturing them and Alfred was looking on disappointed.

“Why am I in trouble? The rule is we can’t go out into the world with _our_ masks. It doesn’t say anything about doing so in someone else’s.” Damian complains. Superman opens his mouth to lecture, probably, but Alfred cuts him off.

“The young master is correct, I suppose. Master Bruce’s rule is that they cannot be outside ARGUS approved cities in their masks. He said nothing about them dressing up as each other outside the cities.”

“And you think Bruce will agree with that?”

“If Master Bruce did not wish his children to find loopholes in his rules, he should not have imposed such strict rules.”

“For kids to follow his rules, he needs to be more lax?” Clark asks, confused, that didn’t make much sense.

“No, Alien. If we think a rule is stupid or unjust or just far too strict, like forbidding us from leaving the manor for doing the right thing, we find ways around it.”

“Master Damian, you are only bound to the manor when grounded, and that is typically because you have done something wrong.”

“Killing someone to protect father is not wrong.”

“Master Bruce disagrees.”

“Father can bite me with his stupid morals.”

“Okay! Off topic!” Clark cuts in., “You’re both still in trouble. You deliberately disobeyed us. ARGUS is not happy.”

“ARGUS is never happy.”

“No, but because of you, the Avengers now know of the Joker.”

“So what?”

“So that is something they will be sticking their nose in even though they have no business there.”

“I’m sorry, was there a point there? That’s not our problem. They want to deal with the psychopath, fine. They can deal with him. I won’t protest to them seeing him make people laugh to their deaths. Or just straight up killing them. Maybe they won’t be so fucking stupid then.” Despite his childhood, Damian was still a teenager, so with that outburst, he turned around and went up to his room. Ignoring his family and the Kents.

“I’m sorry dad. I thought we’d just be getting Jason out and that’d be that. We didn’t expect it to spiral like this. “ Jon says, wringing his hands.

Clark sighs before speaking, “I know son. We just have to be careful. The world is going to be looking for heroes now, and we can’t let them find us.”

“Why not? What’s so wrong with being known by the world?”

Clark sighs again, “I’ll explain later. Let’s go home.” With that, the two flew off, back to metropolis.

_-Avengers Tower-_

“Congratulations,” Fury says as he enters the common room where all the Avengers were hanging out, “You’ve just received your first Cease and Desist.”

“We can get those?” Clint asks around the food he had just shoved in his mouth.

“Yes.”

“Who from and what for?” Tony asks

“ARGUS, and for tracking a criminal known as The Joker. Purple suit, clown make up. You’ve been ordered to either stop tracking him or be arrested.” Fury states, dropping a packet of paper in front of Tony.

“What’s ARGUS?” Tony asks and JARVIS responds.

_“It’s a government association similar to SHIELD. Their acronym stands for ‘Advanced Research Group Uniting Super-humans’. However any further information in behind quite a few walls and I have not wanted to press without Sir’s permission.”_

“We’ll look into it together later.”

“I’m guessing the guys we dealt with earlier were part of the ‘United Superhumans’ “ Clint asks.

“We weren’t given that information. Just that you are to cease tracking the Joker.” Fury states.

“Do we have to hand over any information we got on him?” Tony asks, leafing through the packet.

“No. That was not demanded. Just that you stop and don’t go any further.”

“Huh, were we given any reason why? Is this Joker guy valuable to the government?”

“We were not given that information, Captain. “

“And I take it we weren’t given any information on the vigilantes we dealt with yesterday.”

“That would be correct.”

“And we can’t run facial rec on any of them because they were all wearing face-scrambling tech. Great.”

“Well, we know at least one of them wasn’t human, maybe three.” Clint says.

“Whose the for sure and whose the maybe?” 

“Well, the kid that was flying around for one, and then maybe Red Hood and Batgirl? I mean, that guy was up and walking around with a grocery list of injuries. Also, he mentioned being dead before. And we definitely heard Batgirl do at least two voices that weren’t her own.”

“Humans are the best vocal mimics Barton. Batgirl could be human and just a very good mimic.” Tony states.

“She perfectly mimicked Bucky, how hard would that be? Especially for a girl.”

“If she can mimic voices perfectly, she might not even be a girl,” Steve says and gets an over the top ‘Yes! Good point!’ gesture from Clint, who was still eating.

“Okay, so we have two potentially non-human and one definite non-human that we interacted with yesterday. What does that matter? We can’t do anything unless…” Tony trails off, lost in thought. 

“I’m going to go before he finishes his thought so I can claim I had no knowledge of your stupidity.” Fury says and leaves the room, heading to the elevator to leave the Tower altogether.

“JARVIS, call Brucie.”

“What?” Bruce asks but Tony motions for silence as a voice came over the intercom that was not JARVIS’s. Tony had opted to take his call through the Tower’s speakers, how convenient.

“Wayne Manor, Alfred speaking.” The british accented voice states.

“Hey Alfred, I was wondering if I could speak with Brucie. Oh, it’s Tony. Stark. By the way.” Tony ended up sounding very stilted at the end, it had been a while since he had called Bruce Wayne. Not wanting to deal with the man’s stupidity any more than necessary.

“Hello, Mr. Stark. I’m afraid Master Bruce is currently preoccupied. If it is not confidential between the two of you, perhaps I could be of help?”

“Uh, yeah, maybe. A couple years back, before, uh, Afghanistan, Brucie gave me an open invitation to Gotham…” Tony trailed off, trying to figure out how to word his request. He didn’t even need to stay in the manor, he more just wanted someone who could tell him about the vigilantes and a good hotel in Gotham.

Alfred sighs, “That does sound like Master Bruce. When do you plan on arriving?”

“Uh, what.” Tony was slightly cut off guard before realizing what the butler meant, “Oh, no, Alfred, I, uh, I don’t need to stay in the manor. I was planning on bringing friends and wouldn’t want to put you out too much. I was more looking for any hotel recommendations and maybe some time to talk with Brucie?”

“Oh nonsense Mr. Stark. We have more than enough room here for you and your friends. Besides, the boys are grounded for sneaking out so I will have more than enough help getting your rooms ready. Now, how many of you are coming and when can we expect you?”

“Five. Uh, in three days? Does that give you enough time?” Tony didn’t really have experience in going to someone elses place that wasn’t planned months in advanced by someone other than him. 

“Mr Stark, you could be arriving tomorrow and we’d be ready for you.”

“Oh, uh thats nice. We’ll be there in three days time.”

“See you then, Mr Stark.” With that Alfred hung up.

“So, who’s ready to take a vacation to Gotham?” Tony asks.

_-Three Days Later-_

“Get down from there.” Was the first thing Tony heard when Alfred let them in the door. He saw Brucie standing in the entrance hall looking up at the chandelier. “Do not stick your tongue out at me, get down from there.”

“Who’re you talking to?” Tony asks, instantly getting Brucie’s attention.

“Tony! It’s wonderful to see you again,” Brucie says, immediately engulfing Tony in a hug.

“Oh right, you’re a hugger. How did I forget this?” Tony muttered to himself, then asked, “Who were you talking to?”

“Oh, my youngest is just on the chandelier again. We’ve reinforced the hanger so he shouldn’t fall, but, he still shouldn’t be up there. Especially since he’s grounded.”

“I haven’t left the manor!” A voice calls from the top of the chandelier.

“You’re not on the ground!”

“I don’t think that’s what grounding means.”


	2. Dimensional Disturbance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Initially, this was the dimensional disturbance that happened in Ch4. However, I changed it because I just didn't like how this went.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now this is isolated from the rest of CH4 because after I wrote it, I didn't like the placement, so I wanted to put i maybe later, but having written more of the story, if I do a dimensional disturbance like this, it won't be this. So I'm posting it here.
> 
> Also I didn't like some of the dialogue. Felt to exposition-y. Or just too much.

_“Uh, don’t suppose you would mind taking a detour to Nevada.”_

“I’m not the one flying Oracle.”

_“Right, well, almost everyone is kind of off planet and we have a multiverse anomaly happening. Thanks to STAR Labs software, we know of the potential Earths its from and none of them are particularly good. In fact all of them are very very bad. We might be dealing with Talon, Owlman, The Batman Who Laughs, Overlord Superman, so if you could get Stark to detour to the Nevada desert, that’d be great.”_

“Hey Stark!” Damian calls, knocking on the man’s faceplate.

“You don’t need to do that. I can hear you just fine. What is it?”

“Can we take a detour to Nevada?”

“That is literally on the **otherside of the country**!”

“There’s a multiversal anomaly going down. Please? I promise to answer all of your questions.”

“All of them?”

“Uh huh.” Said nothing of giving honest answers. 

“Widow. Captain. We’re going to Nevada.” Stark says and Damian feels them shift course.

After a few more specific directions, the pair land down on the desert in front of a piece of air that seemed to be bending.

Starks faceplate retracts before he says, “What the fuck.”

“Multiversal anomaly. Someone is breaking down the wall between our universes.” Damina gestures to the bedning air with his hand, “Weird reality.” 

“The future is so weird.” Rogers states, standing behind them with Widow.

“This is _not_ a normal occurence.”

“Maybe for _you_ ”

“This is normal for you?”

“Somewhat? We have a list of all the known multiverses and what goes on in them a little bit. The common multiverses are always the twisted ones.”

“The Twisted ones?” Widow asks.

“Ones that have us, or, someone with our identities but not us, as us. You were briefed on Superman, on his media nickname ‘A God among men’. In some universes he takes that literally and _becomes_ Earth’s god. He becomes a dictator of the highest order. Sometimes roles get reversed, heroes are villains and villains are heroes. Your family gets distorted. There was one small change, one small thing that happened that made them an entirely different person. Or their whole world is wildly different from our own. A while back, there was an invasion from one of these parallel universes, the Batman who Laughs, it was terrifying. My- I thought I lost my family. I attended my grandfather’s funeral and then, we reversed the invasion, sent them back and everything was as it was before. Everyone who died was alive, but with the very vivid memory of being killed. The twisted ones are awful because you see what those closest to you could’ve become if there was one thing different. The Batman Who Laughs is what Batman would be if he gave into the Joker.”

“Gave into the Joker? What does that mean? What does the Joker want?” Guess they didn’t get that far into their investigation.

“The Joker wants chaos. And he wants to break Batman. He wants Batman to kill, because Batman has a very strict code, no killing, because _he knows_ that if he kills, he will spiral and he will never recover. The Joker’s goal is to make that happen. He _killed_ one of my brothers trying to do just that.” Just as Damian finishes, wind rushes by the group. When he turns he sees the bright red and green of the Flash and Arrow. Guess Allen was left behind. Queen rarely went with the League off-world, he did still have a company to run.

“What’s up? Oracle said we had a nasty surprise waiting for us.” Allen says, waving to the Avengers.

“And you are?”

“Oh, I’m the Flash this is Green Arrow.” 

“And you can-” Allen flashes in front of Stark before the man can finish his question,

“Super speed, multi-dimensional travel, time travel sometimes.” 

“That is awesome.”

“Stop fangirling. They’re almost through.” Green Arrow calls, oh how he must hate to be the adult.

“Literally nothing has changed about the weird air.” Widow states.

“Actually, Arrow is right. When they get closer we’re able to discern what dimension they’re from. Before we could only narrow it down to five. Now we’re down to one so they’ll be through in a few minutes. Or less.” Flash explains.

“What dimension are they from?”

“Also why have we gone from universe to dimension?”

“Uh, Earth-23004, Dictator Superman, married to Wonder Woman, dead Batman. And because we’re talking about different dimensions? There are so many universes within our own dimension, so calling them alternate universes isn’t actually correct because they’re from alternate dimensions or realities. However, we call them alternate universes because of the Multiverse theory, which is true. But the name itself is inherently wrong.” Allen explains.

“I have so many questions.” Stark states.

“Ask them later.” Arrow orders as the air rips and a Superman comes out, landing on the ground in a superhero landing with a thud, hard enough to shake it. Wonder Woman follows shortly, landing lighter than Superman had. Stark opens fire upon Superman but, predictably, it did nothing. Damian hid behind Stark, using the man as a shield while he pulled on kryptonite-infused brass knuckles. They were strong enough that he’d be able to damage Superman, but not enough to kill him or weaken him seriously, because having that kind of kryptonite on hand was mean and the alien took great offence. Rolling his eyes, Damian uses Ironman as a boost to jump onto Superman’s shoulders, and start banging on the man’s head with the knuckles. “Help us with Wonder Woman, she’s got Superman.” Arrow orders.

“She’s a kid!” Stark protests but moves to assist the others in taking down Wonder Woman.

“She’s a bat!” 

“What the-” Superman starts, trying to grab at Damian, “Damian get off of me!” Superman manages to grab at his Batgirl cape and pull, Damian responds by tightening his legs around Superman’s throat, grabbing the man’s jaw so the kryptonite knuckles would affect his throat, even a little bit. The cape gives first, tearing away off his costume, so Damian resumes pounding on Superman’s head, and Superman resumes trying to grab hold of _something_ to pull Damian off. It’s pretty clear that he’s not trying to hurt Damian, much, considering how much he’s failing at grabbing onto Damian’s legs and just throwing him.

 _” Get them back through the portal, it’s stable and won’t let anyone from the other end come through.”_ Oracle orders.

“How am I supposed to do that? I’m barely keeping him occupied!” Damian shouts, Superman would’ve heard regardless and he probably heard Oracle too. There hadn’t been any reason to put lead in his cowl, yet, so it’s not like there was anything preventing him from hearing.

“Get off of me!” Superman shouts, eyes glowing red as he catches one of Damian arms and just, yeets him off. Not particularly hard, Damian doesn’t even roll ten feet from him. Damian stands up, glaring at the Superman. “I don’t want to hurt you.” He says as the red leaves his eyes, a hand out in front of him, placating.

“Then what do you want?” Damian asks, pulling out some batarangs, the wouldn’t do much damage but it would still be nice to throw them at him.

“I need to talk to Batman”

 _“Earth -23004, Superman kills Batman for refusing to join his totalitarian government.”_ Oracle states dryly, fully aware the Kryptonian could hear her.

“I made a mistake.”

 _“‘Bruce Wayne found dead by heat vision.’”_ Oracle says, sounding like she was reading off of something, _”Sounds like a mistake.”_ she remarks sarcastically.

“Look, I’m going to talk to him regardless of what you want. I’ll find him myself if necessary, but I want you to come with me.”

“I will not help you find Batman.”

 _“I don’t think he meant in finding Batman, D.”_ Oracle states which makes sense, Batman isn’t actively hiding from Kryptonians so Superman would probably have an easy time finding him, even if he was currently off-world. But, wanting him to go to his universe means,

“And how did I die?”

“Waller. She made you part of her suicide squad”

_“Eh, I believe it. You do not take orders the way she would like you to.”_

“Please, come with us. This world is not so different, you aren’t accepted for who you-” Whatever Superman was going to say gets cutoff by Stark shooting something at him.

“Whatever you’re trying to say. Zip it. Don’t take my stuff.”

“Annoyance.” Was all Superman says as his eyes glow red again. Damian takes him being distracted as an opportunity to do some quick crafting. They didn’t have any red solar grenades on hand, but he could probably jerry-rig something similar with the stuff he has, hopefully not at the cost of Stark’s life.


	3. very Very short

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, i think this was initially going to be part of Ch6, one of the intervals with Sly dying, peeps finding out and reacting, but, idk for sure. Maybe it was going to be an explanation on why I didn't have Barnes or the grandparents reacting in CH6. 
> 
> Idk, but I know i have no idea where I was going with this, how to even write more of it or where it would go in the story.
> 
> So I'm putting it here.

“Not that I’m unhappy here, but why are we here?” Bucky asks. He, Martha Wayne and Thomas Wayne were all at the Kent farm. They got sent here a couple of weeks back but none of them really knew why. 

“Can’t say I know. I just know Bruce called asking us to look after you three for a while,” Martha Kent says, shrugging.

“Well, you have been extremely kind to us Martha,” Thomas says, it took some insistence before they would call Mrs. Kent by her first name, manners and all that. 

“It’s no problem. I have always been a tad curious what kind of people were responsible for such a wonderful boy.”

“Well, we aren’t technically responsible for him. Although, I’m sure Alfred is responsible for at least half of him. I’d bet my pearls that when he first started talking, he had a British accent.” Martha Wayne says.


	4. First draft of Ch7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this was initially what was going on with Ch7, before in the real story i had Babs save Damian with a phone call. I was in such a mood when I wrote it, that when I got out of the mood it felt disjointed. Off. It wasn't really the tone I wanted to go with. Some of it was kept, but most of it I didn't like and didn't want in the fic. It was such a weird tonal shift, imo, that didn't work.

“Sly, we’re just worried. You scared us, we felt awful, we didn’t know what to do.” Rogers was saying, but Damian didn’t really want to listen. But hearing Rogers talk about how Damian’s fake death affected the Avengers was kind of annoying. Like, yeah, you’re _supposed_ to be upset. But this guilt tripping nonsense was getting on Damian’s nerves. Damian drops the phone in his lap and turns to Rogers with a cheerful smile on his face.

“You know, you’re talking about how _you_ felt about all this, but tell me Captain, do you have any idea what it’s like to die? Like die-die. Like getting stabbed in your lungs and feeling yourself drowning in your own blood? Or having your throat slit? Or getting shot in the heart? Or getting poisoned? Or drowning? Or even just getting buried alive?” Damian asks, fake cheer in his voice. He waits just long enough to gauge their reactions but not long enough for either of them to formulate a response, “Because I have,” thanks to his wonderful Grandfather who put him really through too much league training and his mother’s pit madness, “and it sucks. Drowning is awful, in every form. But, you know that’s not the worse part, I’ve made peace with my childhood. What’s truly horrible? When people like you talk about how what happened to _me_ affects them. If I had really broken every bone of my body by falling off a tall building, which _I_ haven’t. My brothers have, I haven’t quite yet, hearing you talk about how you were affected would make me jump off a skyscraper. So, maybe this’ll get through to you. **I _don’t_ care.** I don’t care how you feel, I don’t care how you were affected. You should really get it through your head, I’m not your friend, I’m not a loved one, and I’m not some little kid for you to pity. I deal with you, because I was told to. Partly as a punishment for outing the superhero community to save Hood. And because none of the adults want to. I’m not a kid. I’m an assassin trained to be a non-lethal vigilante. I have been trained since birth to kill, and I was good at it. I decimated entire cities, in the name of my grandfather. I tortured. And I have no regrets.” Flat out lie, Damian has many regrets, but honestly, he’s dug this far, why not get out the jackhammer, “I’m not your friend, nor a kid for you to parent. I’m here, in the miraculous event, you become a threat to us. I’m here to neutralize you. Not to be your friend.” Damian knows this probably wasn’t the best course of action, honestly, it wasn’t even in the top ten, but that didn’t matter. The Avengers had been getting too friendly for his liking, they were treating him too much like a child and not enough like the hypercompetent vigilante he was. If he had let this go on much longer, they probably would’ve started treating him like family, like he should actually care what could happen to them in the event they turn. That speech was probably too much, too many hits, the punishment didn’t fit the crime, but it’s not like he could take it back. Damian looked at the reactions of the two men, and decided he did _not_ want to deal with the fallout. “I’m going to my room.” With that, Damian left.

_”If I may, that was quite rude_ ” JARVIS intones while Damian was taking the elevator to his room.

“It was necessary. Where do they get off acting like that,” Damian grumbles

_”Perhaps, because they care for you. Is that such a foreign concept?”_

“They shouldn’t.”

_”Why not?”_

‘Because I’ve done nothing but lie to them?’ Damian thinks, “Because if it comes down to it, and they become a threat, I will not hesitate to neutralize them. Even if that means death.”

_”I once read somewhere that the more you deny something, the more likely it is to be true. And in that little speech, you said some form of ‘I’m not your friend’ four times,”_

“Is that supposed to be a lot?”

_” Perhaps your speech was more to convince yourself that you’re not their friend, rather than vice versa”_

Damian scoffs, “Why would I want to be friends with a bunch of half-cocked barely competent old people who can barely be called heroes, much less superheroes.” Damian stalks out when the door opens to reveal his floor. He makes a beeline for his room, grabbing a few select things and the case containing his batgirl suit, heading to one of the windows.

_”Ms Wilson, what are you doing?”_

“JARVIS activate protocol Alpha-Theta-Epsilon-5a56ti7u89o2m” It was a protocol Oracle had found in JARVIS’s coding, it forced him to restart, stopping him from monitoring the tower and recording any information. Then Damian got to work. Now, the windows don’t open, something about the floor and how it was a hazard, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be opened. Damian pulls out his glass cutter, one he had gotten from Kyle, used expressly on skyscraper glass. Damian manages to get halfway through before someone barges into his room.

“What the FUCK did you do to JARVIS?” Stark yells. Damian studiously ignores him and goes back his glass cutting. “Kid!” Stark yells, Damian could hear him stomping through the rooms, and he tried to speed up, to get out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, as I mentioned in the real story, there were 3 versions of Ch7, this one, the one posted and a different one. The different one is, weird, like, really weird, I have no idea where I was going with it. Too sleep-deprived. but its also like a full chapter, so idk if you want to see it? Sound off in the comments if you want to read it, but fair warning, in the chapter, I make implications of SladeDick (Never happened but it references rumours and such), and Damian/Billy (also, never happens(ed), rumours and such), but yeah. 
> 
> Just, comment whether you'd want to see that sort of thing. I can post it whenever. And i don't need much prompting. One or two comments of 'Yes, post it' and it'll get posted at my soonest convenience.


	5. The dumspter fire that would've been chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I needed 0 prompting and me just being too tired to care. So, this is what Ch7 almost was. Before I realized a) not the direction I wanted, b)made 0 sense and c) don't know the character well enough to really be writing them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** (I guess? Idk) stuff thats in this chapter; implications of Sladdick (nothing happens, just rumours and the ilk), and Damian/Billy (again, nothing happens, just rumours and shit)
> 
> idk, enjoy the dumpster fire that almost was. The beginning is the same, it really only takes a sudden change at the Park.

Damian could understand being on house arrest. He did fake his death and not tell anyone. He could understand if his father didn’t want him going out for a while and whatnot. 

What he did _not_ understand is where Stark got off putting him on house arrest. The man had no power of him and yet Stark wouldn’t let Damian- Sly- leave Avenger’s Tower. The worst part was the other Avengers were in on it and his family were completely unsympathetic. Jon had been nice enough to bring over some clothes, makeup and wigs so he could keep the Sly charade going while under Tower arrest, but that also meant Damian had to deal with him crying into his chest about Damian faking his death and whatnot. 

Damian’s not entirely sure the stuff was worth it.

Still, for the past week, this had been his life. He definitely spent a couple of days just in his room (which was an entire floor of the tower- that was decadent and too much even by Damian’s standards), he also got lost exactly once and made JARVIS swear to never tell anyone. But otherwise, he hung out in the Avenger’s common area, acting as Sly and doing his damndest not to curse his brothers when they updated social media about him being a recluse, and hence why he wasn’t appearing anywhere. He knows when he leaves this place he’s going to have to keep that up. Still, keeping up with Sly’s voice wasn’t the easiest thing to do for seven days straight. It’s not hard, but it’s not pleasant to only be able to speak in a voice that isn’t yours.

“Hey,” Damian looked up from his phone, from where Oracle was updating him on Barnes and his grandparents adjustment to Kansas (Damian still doesn’t know why father sent them out there a couple of weeks backs, but Father is not one to share), to look at the Captain, who was sitting down beside him on the couch, “Me, Widow and Hawkeye are going on a mission, so it’ll just be you and Tony here.”

Damian furrows his brow, that denomination doesn’t make sense. There were five avengers living in the tower last he checked, “What about Dr. Banner?”

“He flew out to India yesterday, he wanted to do more work out there. Don’t worry, I’m sure you and Tony’ll get along great.”

He actually didn’t mind Stark most of the time, the time when he’s not holding Damian prisoner in the tower. “We’ll get along when I’m allowed to leave the tower again.” Damian snarks, going back to his phone. Dr. Palmer had started giving him updates on Ava’s condition. So far, it’s not good. They’re able to slow her deterioration but they can’t stop it altogether. They aren’t entirely sure why it’s happening, and how to fix it. Currently, they were thinking of simulating the initial explosion that made Ava like she is. But they’re lacking quite a bit of information, mainly where and how was the Quantum tunnel wrong, and what materials were used?

“Maybe if you didn’t nearly die, you wouldn’t be on house arrest.” Damian rolls his eyes, texting Dr. Palmer that he’d toss Drake the case in case he could be useful and dig up useful information.

“I didn’t almost die. I was perfectly fine the entire time. You thought I died, I was perfectly fine hanging with my sister.” Damian states, which wasn’t entirely true, he was almost killed by Ava, but, semantics.

“Maybe you should tell people who care about you when you’re going to do that sort of thing.” The Captain says, clearly unhappy with Damian’s deliberate choice to not tell them.

“Not unless you get good at acting real soon. What’s the point of faking my death if those who care for me are not so distraught that’s it’s convincing and not suspicious? God, you have never had to publicly fake your death and disappear to China because an evil organization wants your head on a platter, and it shows.”

“See. You say things like that, I want to let you out of the tower even less.” Stark cuts in, walking over to the couch. He had just arrived a few minutes prior and Damian had been pointedly ignoring him.

“Really? So if I lie and say my life has been all gumdrops and lollipops I’ll be able to actually live my life?” Damian asks sarcastically, he knows the answer to that.

Rogers sighs, and opened his mouth to what Damian would presume would be a lecture when Damian’s phone rings. 

“Sorry, gotta take this.” Damian stands up and answers the phone without looking, walking away from the pair, “Hello,”

_“You looked like you could use a save.”_ Gordon states as greeting.

“You’re not wrong. How are things back home?”

_“Same old, same old. How’s the tower?”_

“Dreadfully boring.”

_”Rogers looks to be leaving soon, so I think you’re safe.”_

“If you say so, talk to you later,” with that, Gordon hangs up. Damian turns to see Steve standing up.

“I gotta go, be good.” Who he was talking to specifically was a mystery, or maybe he was talking to both of them, either way he leaves with those as his final words.

“Can we at _least_ go to the park or something? I swear I’m getting cabin fever.”

Stark seemed to think for a while before nodding, “Yeah, sure, what harm could come of it?” 

“Yes” Damian cheers quietly and follows Stark to the elevator, heading down to the garage and heading out. Stark parks a short distance from Central Park and the pair walk from there. Damian’s honestly happy enough to just be breathing fresh air, he doesn’t really pay attention to his surroundings as they walk, just happy to not be in the tower. So he doesn’t notice someone watching, he doesn’t notice them coming up to him until they grab his arm. Damian’s attention immediately snaps to the kid holding his arm, barely restraining himself from flipping the kid and breaking his hold. It takes him a moment to place why he would immediately not defend himself. It’s because he knows the kid. “Billy. What’re you doing here?” Didn’t he normally operate out of Philly?

“I wanted to talk to you.” Billy glances over at Stark, who had been watching the interaction with a raised eyebrow, “Privately.” He adds.

Damian turns to Stark, “Can you please wait on that bench?” Damian asks, pointing to a bench out of hearing range, “Please? I promise we won’t get up to anything.” Stark looks like he wants to deny Damian’s request but sighs and walks over to a bench closer than the one Damian pointed at. One in hearing range.

“Sly, right?” Billy asks, quietly enough Stark couldn’t hear them.

Damian’s smile was sharp, “So you’re caught up. What do you want Billy?” Damian asks, something tells him Billy isn’t here for a social call.

Billy takes his hand off Damian’s arm to start using them to enunciate his points, “Right, so you know how you got in trouble with your last team because you didn’t have adult permission?”

“There was more to it than that, but yes. I remember the trouble I got into with the Titans. What does that have to do with you?”

“Well I was thinking, what if we got a team together?”

“Another team? Without a Leaguer’s permission? Yeah, that’s going to end well. I’m probably going to be grounded until I’m fifty.” Damian rolls his eyes and turns around to go, but Billy grabs his arm.

“But you would have a Leaguer’s permission.” Damian turns around, an eyebrow raised. He’s pretty sure, even though Shazam is considered part of the JL, everyone still knows he’s a kid. “You’d have adult permission, with an adult on the team. They couldn’t say it’s unsanctioned and disband it.”

“I’m pretty sure the Justice League knows you’re a kid.”

“I’m a teenager, and older than you.” Billy snarks, “But they don’t. I haven’t told anyone. Except Cyborg, but he hasn’t told anyone.”

“You literally told all the sidekicks.”

“Well yeah, you’re kids too. Come on, think about it, wouldn’t a new team be awesome?”

Damian sighs, he was going to be spread way too thin. “Who do you want on the team?”

Billy whoops with joy before he says, “I was thinking Abuse, Nobody, Superboy and Red Arrow. Along with you and me. Three girls, three boys.”

“That’s four boys and two girls.” Damian corrects and Billy just gestures to Damian’s current look. Which, fair.

“You already go to girls night.”

“Yes I do.” Damian sighs, “Fine. Do you want me to recruit them or…”

“Well, I could probably get Superboy on board, and I know Abuse and Nobody are your friends so you’d probably have an easier time getting them on board. And Red Arrow scares me.”

“So you want me to recruit ninety percent of the team? Great. Uh,” Damian pulls out his phone -Sly’s phone, meaning his friend’s contact numbers weren’t in there, “give me your number.” Billy immediately takes the phone and starts typing in his number,”I’m going to call Oracle and ask her to get someone to drop my real phone off at a safehouse, you’re going to pick it up and text Abuse and Nobody to ask if they want to be part of your team. Or you can bring it to me and I can do it.” Billy hands the phone back to Damian after sending himself a quick text. 

“Thank you,”

“Don’t- it’s nothing. But, I really think you should be asking Abuse and Nobody. I’m friends with literally everyone you named, you’re friends with Superboy. I think it’d be in your best interest and the team’s if you become friends with Abuse and Nobody first.”

“You think?”

“I’d also recommend getting Red Arrows friendship but I think the best you can hope for it her respect. I can set up a meeting with Abuse and Nobody if you don’t want to brave Gotham by your lonesome.”

“Yeah, that’d be great.”

Damian hesitates, taking in Billy’s nervous stance, “Why come to me? Why not go to Superboy? Or even my father?”

“Dude, you literally created a brand new identity two-fold earlier this year, and you’re already well known throughout the world, and no one even tries to mess with you. You’re badass. Also, you’ve gotten together two teams previously without any help from anyone in the League, you’re around my age and I figured you’d be the best person to go to.”

“And you’re nervous because…”

“I’m not good at making friends and you kind of scare me.”

“...Only kind of?” Billy swallows audibly at Damian’s tone, which was the reaction Damian was hoping for. Always good to incite fear in Metas. “Three humans and three metas is a good balance. I’ll try to get Red Arrow on board. Bye Billy.” With that, Damian turns and heads over to Stark. “See? Nothing happened.” Damian says when he reaches Stark. Who, weirdly enough, was glaring at Billy. Damian furrows his brows and turns to look at Billy, who was very pointedly not looking in their direction. Damian turns back to Stark, raising an eyebrow, “Everything okay Mr. Stark?” Which finally got Stark’s attention on Damian. 

“Yeah, yeah,” The man says, getting up and gently guiding Damian away, along the walking path, “Just, who was that kid?”

“Billy. He’s a friend. Why?”

“Just, I might’ve run facial rec on him, and name searched him. Well, I had JARVIS do this.”

“Billy’s not a bad guy,”

“He stole a car,”

Really? “He’s a teenager. You never went joyriding?”

“Have you?”

“Yeah,” In the Batmobile, the BatHog, more that his father will never know about.

“Really?” Stark’s eyebrows were up, clearly surprised at Damian’s admission.

“Well, Batman can’t really report his cars stolen, can he?” 

“You stole from _Batman_?”

“His stuff is voice-activated! It’s like he’s begging for it to be stolen.” Really he had made the cars voice-activated because his brothers kept taking them out and he wanted that to stop. Oops.

“You can imitate Batman’s voice?”

“You can’t?” Damian asks, using Batman’s voice, returning to Sly’s to say, “It’s not that hard.” 

“For you maybe.” Stark says, shaking his head, “I knew you were a mimic but it’s so weird to see you speak and hear a different voice come out.”

Well, he’s gonna be really weirded out when he hears Damian’s real voice come out of his mouth. “Just takes practice,” Damian shrugs.

“I’ll take your word for that. But, we’re off topic. We were talking about your friend back there.”

“He’s my friend,” Damian shrugs, “What’s more to talk about?”

“I don’t know, he just seemed, you two seemed close.”

Close? “Close?” They barely knew each other. Damian has literally never interacted with Billy before. Not one on one.

“You were whispering, and there was something about your body language,” Damian looked over at Stark, confused and wondering where the hell the older man was going with this, what conclusion he had come to. “Do you have a crush?” And somehow that was not a conclusion Damian thought anyone would ever come to.

“No! That was literally the first time we interacted without a group of friends.” How the fuck did Stark come to that conclusion?!

“Does he have a crush on you?” Why is Stark still going with this?

“No! I don’t know, why are you on this train? Get off this train Stark.”

“I’m just asking! It seemed like he liked you,”

“What do you know about teenagers? You haven’t been one since the eighties!”

“True, but does young love ever change?”

“Maybe! You sure as hell know nothing about it.” Damian hated this conversation with his entire being. He wanted to run as far away from it as possible.

“You know, methinks the lady doth protest too much.”

“First off, the line is The lady doth protest too much, methinks. Second off, are you seriously quoting Hamlet to me?!”

“That’s from Hamlet?” 

Damian groans, he hates this and he wants to go home. Why is Stark so clingy? “Thirdly, that line is in reference to an actor overacting their declarations of matrimony. Being so excessive about her protests of never remarry, she’s unbelievable. That’s the opposite of what is happening. That line would be relevant if I was trying to convince you that Billy and I are in fact dating, and-” Damian gets cut off by some people calling out to Stark. Damian tries to discreetly slide away, but Stark keeps him close. Damnit. 

Damian just keeps his head down and tries to ignore everyone, not even Father was harassed like this when he was out. Then again, in Gotham, most of the people who’d harass Father were supervillains. Father had a reputation for being kind and a bit of an idiot, but he’s never had a reputation for allowing the media to bother his family, even going so far as punching a camera when it’s holder got too close to one of his brothers and bothered them too much. Obviously, father paid to replace the camera but the paparazzi got the memo, and those that didn’t, soon got that memo from the electric grass outside the manor. Do not bother the Wayne family.

“Who’s your boyfriend?” Damian furrowed his brows at the question, he was reasonably sure Stark was dating Ms. Potts. “Young lady?” The follow up made Damian come to the very regrettable conclusion. They were talking to him. Damian looked up at the people around him, singling out the one who asked the question.

“I don’t have a boyfriend.” 

“You were talking about him earlier. Billy?”

Oh fuck. “Nonononono. No. I’m not dating Billy. I’m not dating anyone.”

“Oh, I’m sure he’d be hurt to hear that. Do we have a last name for the boy? Or even a picture?”

Okay, fuck this guy. “Do I have a public reputation?” Damian asks, looking up at Stark.

“Uh, technically no. Why?” Stark was, rightfully, suspicious and wary.

“Because I’m about to get one by murdering someone.” Damian moves forward, but Stark grabs Damian’s arm and holds him back.

“I don’t think she wants to answer any questions,” He says diplomatically.

“You’re daughter is quite violent Mr. Stark”

“I’m extremely violent and unrepentant about any harm that may come to people who harass me!” You know, it’s a good thing Damian doesn’t have a reputation with the presses because that would mean he’d have to act quite differently right now. And he kind of prefers threatening the media. Especially when they talk about his personal life. It’s _personal_.

“I think we need to go.” Stark says, and people move to let them leave. “You cannot threaten people!” Stark scolds on their way back to the car. 

“I think I just did.”

“You can get in so much trouble for that, do you have any idea what kind of articles they could write?”

“Starks Illegitimate Love Child Inherits Howard Violent Tendencies?” Damian guesses.

“Love child?”

“You did hear him call me your daughter, right?”

“I was more focused on preventing a lawsuit. Ugh, I’ll get SI’s PR team on it. But you need to behave in front of the media. No violent tendencies.” Stark states as they walk up to the car. Damian sighs but remains silent as he gets in, pulling out his phone, which was vibrating too much for his comfort.

Damian opens his phone and goes to his messages. One from a private number that just says ‘Explain’. It’s not too hard to guess that that is from Father.

The chat actually causing his phone to go crazy is from a new group chat Damian’s never seen before. Oracle had sent a short video of Damian saying ‘Billy and I are in fact dating’ followed by her laughing, then adding Brown and Cain into the chat. Who in turn started messaging and adding in Richard and Todd. Wonderful. Damian types a very short message and sends it before muting the chat, ‘Fuck you all.’

“Somehow, I blame you,” Damian states as they pull out and drive away.

“For what?”

“For people thinking I’m dating Billy Batson.”

“I’m sorry his last name is Batson? Is his Batman’s kid?”

Damian snorts, “No, he’s a friend. One I would like to keep.” Damian states, checking social media to see that while Sly isn’t tagged in any of the videos, which makes sense, Stark was getting tagged, and a hashtag of #whosBilly had started. Great. And there were so many videos. Including ones with short commentary that summarized to people thinking he protested against them being together too much. Damian is going to kill Stark. Damain’s phone buzzed with a new text. From Billy.

_Why do people think we’re dating?_

Which was followed quickly by Billy texting,

_WHY DID YOU SAY WE’RE DATING?!_

Which in turn was followed by,

_Wait how many Billy’s do you know?_

Damian waits a minute, making sure no other texts were coming through when he responds.

**Because I was making a point to Stark about a reference he used. I stated that the reference would be more correct if I was trying to convince Stark that we were dating rather than trying to convince we weren’t -which is what I was initially doing. I’ll deal with it. Don’t worry.**

Damian shuts off his phone after he sends the text, looking out the window of the car and realizing they weren’t heading back to the tower.

“Where are we going?”

“Oh, I uh, I planned for us to go on a little vacation. The tower just feels so empty without the others and they’re going to be gone for a few weeks so,” Stark shrugs, “Also I figured you try to make a prison break if you were in the tower much longer.”

“You’d’ve been correct. So, where are we going?”

“Malibu.”

“We’re going to the _other side of the country_?” Damian demands, which actually wouldn’t be too bad. He’d be able to meet up with Emiko and maybe do damage control.

“Not like you’re getting off house arrest.”

“God, you suck. Where am I going to run off to on the western seaboard? I live in New Jersey!”

“Where did you run off to when you died?”

“Purgatory.” Stark doesn’t respond and Damian doesn’t try to incite conversation. He turns his phone back on, hesitating for a minute before texting Richard for some advice.

What he got back wasn’t particularly helpful. But Richard was a fast texter.

_Is this mysterious Billy really that bad?_

**We’re not dating**

_how does Billy feel about this_

Rather than answer, Damian just screenshots his and Billy’s earlier conversation and sends it to Richard.

_Okay, but did you actually *ask* if Billy minded that the whole world thinks he’s dating Tony Starks Illegitimate Love Child?_

**Do you have advice on how to fix this or not?**

_Well, when me or B are accused of dating someone we’d rather not, we make a point of being seen out with someone else. Typically he goes out with models and whatnot, I tend to beg my teammates for help._

**Do you have any advice that doesn’t involve me making a different friend fake date me?**

_Uhhhh, no. Maybe ask Tim?_

Damian groans, that’s the last person who needs to be in his business. 

**Never in a million years.**

_I thought you 2 were getting along??????_

**Doesn’t mean i want him in my life. Besides, considering the rumours I’ve heard, you’re practically my stepfather.**

_????????_

_What rumours?_

_There are rumours I’ve slept with B??????_

_Where have you heard them????_

**Dick, who am I in your phone?**

_Sly?_

**Mhmm. So that would make my father…**

_Slade?_

There were a couple of minutes between that message and the next one Richard sent.

_WHO IS SAYING I’VE SLEPT WITH SLADE????_

_WHO TOLD *YOU* THIS?????!!!_

Damian turns off his phone, laughing at Richard’s freak out. It was a pretty common rumour. Damian had known of it before this whole thing had started, mainly because of Todd. But it honestly wasn’t that uncommon of rumour for civilians to spread. Too many people thought Richard had a certain proclivity for older men.

“What’s so funny?”

“Oh, you know, torturing your loved ones by implying they’ve slept with your father.”

“I, I don’t understand you sometimes.”

“A lot of people think Nightwing and Deathstroke have had a… biblical relationship.” Damian says, before giggling again. 

“You’re laughing, at the fact that someone you call your brother-”

“Batbrother”

“-Is heavily implied to have had sexual relations with your father?”

“They haven’t. But it’s very fun to torture Nightwing with the rumours. Especially because he apparently had no idea they existed.”

“Ah. Also, turn your phone to airplane mode. We’re at the airstrip.” Stark says, parking the car and getting out. Damian follows, switching his phone to airplane mode without even glancing at what Richard had texted him. Wasn’t particularly important at the moment, and the longer Damian didn’t respond, the more hilarious it’ll be. Damian follows Stark onto the plane, taking the seat across from him. “It’s a five hour flight, you want anything?”

“We could watch a couple of Star Wars movies.” Damian shrugs, he knows Richard and the others enjoy them. He hasn’t watched them in years, he nitpicked the techniques too much.

“We could do that.”

_-Batcave-_

“Master Bruce, if I may be so bold, did you expect Master Damian to take to Batgirl in such a way?” Alfred asks while tidying up the cave. Bruce was sitting at the Batcomputer, some of the monitors were filled with Batgirl’s exploits. Her successes. Her failures. Her death and resurgence. Then disappearance when Sly remained with the Avengers in New York

“I didn’t think Damian would ever like Batgirl. I expected him to throw a tantrum, be upset, I expected Barbara to be angry. Never in a million years did I expect them both to agree with my decision and actually do it. It was supposed to be a lesson on breaking rules. Now I feel like I need to ask Diana to speak with Damian.” Bruce explains, he was only so candid with Alfred when there was no one else around. Which there wasn’t. The cave was abandoned save for Alfred and Bruce.

“Ms Prince? Why?”

“I think she’ll be helpful for Damian.” Before Bruce could expand on that, a loud crash sounded from upstairs. Bruce sighs, dropping his head to his hand. His children could be quite destructive. 

“I believe you should check that out, Master Bruce.” Alfred states.

“You think?” Bruce asks, but gets up and heads up the stairs and into the manor. He has to search a bit to find his children. Richard was hyperventilating, Cassandra was trying to soothe him while his other children were just laughing. “Do I want to know?”

Jason was the one who answers, between laughs, “Damian broke Dickie.”

Which was simultaneously not an answer at all and a perfectly good answer.

What had his youngest done _now_?

_-Stark Malibu House-_

“Nifty house,” Damian says, grabbing his bags from the car Stark drove from the airport to the house. Apparently, Stark had had Damian packed up by the time they hit Central Park.

“Nifty?” Stark asks, grabbing his own bags.

“It’s a word.”

“Not one that’s been used in this decade.” With that, Stark leads them into the house.

“If you say so old man,” Damian grumbles but follows dutifully.

“Old man? You used the word Nifty five seconds ago.”

“And that somehow makes me older than the person who grew up during the Cold War?”

Stark scoffs, “Guest bedroom is thattaway” He says, pointing down a hallway.

“You’re soooo helpful.” Damian says and stalks down the hallway.

_”Third door on your right,”_ JARVIS intones from somewhere. Damian does his best not to jump, he doesn’t understand why he didn’t think JARVIS would be here, but it still surprised him. Still, Damian followed JARVIS’s instructions and entered the guest room. _“Sir has asked me to inform you that he will be in his lab and if you require anything to ask me. You are still not allowed to leave the premises and the doors will not open for you unless in the event of an emergency”_ JARVIS says as Damian’s unpacking.

“Thanks.” Damian says, putting away his clothes and stopping short when he realizes something, “Hey JARVIS? I had a case at the Tower, it looks like a metal briefcase, is locked with a biometric scan, it hd my Batgirl suit in it? Do you know where it is?”

_”Mr Stark wishes for a peaceful retreat, so superheroing has been left in New York”_

“Are you _shitting_ me,” Damian mutters, flopping down onto his bed. A second later, his phone rings. Damian answers without looking, giving a grumpy “Hello” to the person on the other end.

“You know, for someone with a boyfriend, you don’t sound too happy.” 

“Wally? What’re-How’d- what?”

“Emiko gave me this number, we do still keep in touch. Not much, Crush and Djinn are still off in the stars, but I saw you on trending and I had to call.”

Damian groans, “Ugh, if you’re just going to make fun of me, I’m hanging up and blocking you.”

“I’m not going to make fun of you. I am going to ask who Billy is. Because I know of exactly one Billy, and you better not be dating that one”

“I’m not dating anyone! But yes. That is the Billy I was talking about.”

“Oof, has he checked social media recently?”

“I don’t know? I don’t keep _that_ much contact with him. Why?”

“Well, there are a lot of theories on who ‘Billy’ is, also a lot of theories as to who the hell _you_ are, but someone posted pictures they took of you and Billy talking.”

“ _Fuck_. That’s bad.”

“Yeah, people are reposting them, the pictures are getting a lot of steam.”

“Can you do anything about it?”

“Who do I look like, Oracle?” 

“Ugh, I need to damage control this. And Richard was useless. His advice was ‘fake date someone else’. What kind of advice is that?”

“Well, it’d get attention off of Billy in a flash,”

“Haha.”

“What?” Clearly, Wally hadn’t realized his pun, “Oh, shut up.” And now he did. “Anyone you care to fake date?”

“I’d rather not. I’ll just, call Billy, talk to him about this. I also have to talk to Mr. Stark about what he’s telling the presses about me.”

“Good luck.” Wally hangs up and Damian just drops the phone by his head. 

“Hey JARVIS, any idea what Mr Stark intends to tell the press?”

_” Sir has not made any notes on such matter. However, the SI PR department intends to confirm you are Sir’s daughter and state that you are not, in fact, dating anybody.”_

“Thanks, JARVIS,” Damian says as his phone begins to ring, he answers it without looking, not even getting a greeting in before Billy starts talking.

“You said you were going to handle it, but why am I seeing pictures of myself on trending? Pictures of us. That contain me. My face! What is happening?”

“Someone took pictures of us while we were talking, I’m too used to Gotham, so I didn’t expect to deal with this. If we want this handled quickly, we have two options.”

“Two options sound promising.”

“Option one, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, we pretend to date. This will throw you into the spotlight for a short while, but people will ultimately tire of it.”

“Bad option.”

“Option two is I get one of my other friends to pretend to date me, post a picture of us kissing or something, people are now attracted to my actual SO, you’re forgotten.”

“Why are both options fake dating?”

“Because that’s the advice Richard gave me. And it’s the speediest way to resolve this. SI won’t post their announcement until tomorrow at the earliest. And it doesn’t _matter_ what I say because people already think I’m lying.”

“Have you tried?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Have you tried telling them we’re just friends?”

Damian sighs, he knows how this will end, he’d been given enough of a media lesson from his mother to know this is a bad idea, “Do you want me to?” 

“Yes!”

“Give me five.” Damian says, moving his phone and minimizing the call, going onto instagram and posting an old picture along with one of the pictures taken of him and Billy, with the caption, ‘Hiya, you might recognize me from the second picture. I’m Sly, and Billy and I are just friends. Nothing more. I know SI has a statement about me, so I’ll let them tell you more about me.’ Damian adds the appropriate hashtags, tags Billy in the picture and posts it. “Done”

“Thank you.” A beat later,” Why did you tag me?!”

“Was I not supposed to?”

“I hate you.”

“Mhm, I’ll call you back in an hour with the results.”

“Results?” Damian doesn’t answer, just hangs up.

_” I do believe that was considered rude.”_

“Yeah well, so was not explaining that people consider me a liar now, I say we’re just friends, I’m going to get flooded with people showing me that we’re looking at each other with heart eyes or some bullshit. I’m too tired to deal with this shit.” Damian groans, “I really should’ve explained it to Billy, god he doesn’t deserve this.”

_“I don’t believe anyone deserves to have this many people involved in their personal life”_

“And yet…” Damian sighs, “Which way’s the kitchen JARVIS?” Damian asks, getting up and leaving his room. He follows JARVIS’s instructions and finds the kitchen, going through all the utensils and stuff in Stark’s fridge. Making a mental list of what they have and don’t have and what to get.

_“Miss Wilson, an hour has passed since you ended the call with MR Batson. You have 100+ notifications on both Instagram and Twitter. Mr. Batson has also tried to call you twice but I silenced your phone after you told it, and I quote ‘To shut the fuck up’ after it started ringing.”_ JARVIS says.

Which was expected. Damian stops what he’s doing and grabs his phone, he had tossed it on a counter away from what he was doing so it didn’t bother him. When he opens it up, he sees the missed call notifications and the texts from Billy, but ignores them in favour of going to Sly’s social media. He’d be in tagged in too many posts, most just posting the pictures of him and Billy and saying ‘clearly Sly doesn’t know what love looks like’ or something to that degree. 

He didn’t even understand why people were obsessing over this. All the pictures show is Billy paying attention to him, looking him in the eyes. There’s one of Billy stopping him from leaving where whoever took the picture managed to catch Billy looking desperate. That one people had taken to captioning ‘When Bae leaves you’, which was just annoying. There’s also one of Billy grabbing Damian’s arm and the short staring contest they had before Damian placed who Billy was.

“JARVIS, why are people so stupid?” Damian asks, switching from instagram to twitter.

_”I cannot say, Ms Wilson. But I believe people are being so interested in your love life for the same reason they were interested in Sir’s lovelife as a teenager.”_

“Which is?” Damian asks, scrolling through twitter, even his _family_ had taken to being dicks about this. Both the Waynes and the Wilsons. Which was just fucking peachy.

_” You’re famous and they want a scandal.”_

“There’s nothing scandalous about Billy Batson.” Damian dismisses, finally going to his texts, ignoring Richard’s and going straight to Billy’s.

_“There is actually quite a bit that makes Mr Batson scandalous.”_ JARVIS says with some clear hesitation. Damian narrows his eyes at the ceiling and puts down his phone.

“Explain.”

_“Aside from the class differences, and his autotheft, he does have a history of violence and cruelty.”_

“So do I.”

_“That will not matter. I believe they’re called double standards. They will do all they can to turn this into a scandal, for their own amusement with no care for how it affects you or Mr. Batson.”_

“Ugh,” Damian groans, why do people care so much? It’s not their life! “What’re the chances they forget about this in a few days?”

_“Quite low unless something peculiar happens. That steals the attention.”_

“Something peculiar?”

_“Something unexpected, something that has not happened before in recent years.”_

“Hmmm,” Damian hums as he opens a new chat, typing in the number he has memorized, the sending the message, 

**Hey, Remember that blackmail I have on you?**

He gets a response within the minute, _Regretabbly._

**Great. Do something for me and I’ll delete it all.**

_What do you need?_

**Get the media attention off of me and Billy**

_That’s all? That’s easy._

**I’ll hold you to those words.**

_“Do you have a plan, Ms Wilson?”_ JARVIS asks after Damian puts down his phone and goes back to what he was doing.

“Nope, but I have enough blackmail on enough people that I’m sure they can figure something out.”

_“I’m not sure that’s a wise decision, Ms Wilson.”_

“Well, I got nothing else. Not like I can go cause a scandal by my lonesome with some friend. I’m kind of on house arrest.”

_” I suppose that is a fair point.”_

“I know it is. Now, can I get you to order a bunch of stuff for me?”

_” What do you need? And perhaps once you’re done, you can call Mr. Batson back?”_

“Oh, right, probably should do that. Later.” With that, Damian started listing off stuff he wanted.

_-later-_

“This is worse than before.” Billy groans when Damian calls him back.

“Yup, they figured I was a liar before, now I’m a blind idiot who cannot see that you are hopelessly in love with me. Don’t you love the internet?”

“I’m not in love with you! What is happening?”

“I know, but, the internet sucks at distinguishing friendships and romantic relationships. I’m having someone handle it, well, handle getting the media off our fictitious relationship.”

“You couldn’t have gotten someone on it earlier?”

“You know, I don’t exactly have experience with this sort of thing. I know what to expect from lessons but living it is a little different than just being told about it.”

“Yeah, well, you sound too calm about it. Like you don’t care.”

“I don’t. They’re wrong, and I don’t care what they say. I have the ability to ignore them, probably helps I’m locked in the house.”

“Probably! I can’t transform! There are people _everywhere_. They keep asking me questions and when I tell them we’re not dating and we’re just friends, they say that I don’t have to hide the relationship anymore. Why can’t they just believe me?”

“Because they’re morons. Look,

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sure the Hamlet ref is wrong, IDK if it is and im too tired to really care to check. Also, it's a failed chap so... who cares


End file.
